Chapter 5: Greed

… I saw multitudes

to every side of me; their howls were loud

while, wheeling weights, they used their chests to push.

They struck against each other; at that point,

each turned around and, wheeling back those weights,

cried out: Why do you hoard? Why do you squander?

-Inferno

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief after at last leaving the repulsive nightmare that was Gluttony. Upon exiting they saw a crumbling golden bridge leading downwards to an iron gate gilded with more gold. Several shades crowded around this gate, slumped over in a state of despair. As Shepard and company passed them, they could see two demons standing guard over the gates. They were easily over seven feet tall with charcoal skin, long twisting black horns, and armor that was black and gold. They narrowed their fire-colored eyes upon seeing Shepard and company. No words needed to be exchanged between the two parties for both to realize that a fight was inevitable. So it was that after a brief scuffle the two demons lay dead, bursting into flames as they fell.

"Thank you living ones." A female shade said. "Those demons have tormented us for some time."

"Who are you?" Shepard asked.

"I am Clodia. I was a drunkard and gambler in life and for these crimes I am consigned here, in the area between Gluttony and Greed. Those were my chief sins you see, along with many, many affairs. I thank you for getting rid of those demons, even if it is a small comfort for a damned soul such as I."

"Actually, I just so happen to have the means to free you."

The shade's tired-looking eyes widened in shock as she heard this. "You do?"

"Yes." And then with a wave of his enhanced omni-tool, Shepard absolved Clodia's soul as he had several others already.

"Thank you." Clodia said as she ascended before adding: "If you happen to encounter a man named Cicero, don't bother absolving him. He condemned me in life but still slept in my bed."

"I'll keep that in mind." Shepard noted as Clodia's soul finished ascending and then vanished in a flash of light. With this concluded, Shepard pressed one of his armored hands up against the gates and pushed. To his surprise the gates did not resist, and parted for him and his crew almost immediately. Moving through them, Shepard and his crew entered the next circle. No sooner did they were they confronted with large mounds of machinery turning gears at all times, harvesting more and more minerals from the bowels of the underworld as hot melted gold spewed forth out of the mouths of human shaped statues and into the ground to form a lake of the stuff.

"I have to say I never imagined Hell to be so...mechanical." Shepard noted as he and the squad continued to advance through the latest circle of the inferno, seeing as they did how the shades in this circle were trapped in these golden lakes much the same way the gluttons were trapped in the slush and stomach acids in the previous circle, screaming as the hot liquid gold seared their souls. The ground itself was gilded with silver and gold, and with spikes made entirely of the latter also jutting out of the ground. In the center of this circle was a massive structure covered completely in ever-turning gears the color of rusted metal.

"And now we come to Greed." Orpheus remarked. "The Fourth Circle of the Inferno. The realm in which lies both those who hoarded their money and coveted material things above anything else, and also those who were careless with their fortunes and squandered them. Both crimes are punished here in equal amounts, and all the while all the gold there ever was and ever will be, will not bring any kind of comfort to these people or do anything to alleviate their suffering."

As the group continued to look on, they indeed saw mounds of gold coins rising up and up in what seemed to be infinite amounts. Hands stuck out of these mountains of gold clawing at thin air in a desperate attempt to escape from their eternal burial beneath the coins, as meanwhile hoarders and squanderers fought each other viciously for the piles of gold lying about, never mind that there was nowhere such wealth could be spent in Hell. For these people who took to swinging large sacks filled with gold at one another, that was of no consequence.

"We still do not understand why organics are so often compelled to take their obsession with material goods to such destructive extremes." Legion observed as it analyzed some squanderers and hoarders continuing to smash the heavy bags of money into one another.

"Gold has a curse to it." Orpheus' shade said sadly.

"Well, what do you know. Looks like The Devil was right."

The sound of that unfamiliar voice prompted everyone to turn about to its source. A small army of shades armed with pistols, assault rifles, and shotguns were in front of them. Many of them wore the armor of the mercenary groups the Eclipse and the Blue Suns, as well as the armor of the Shadow Broker's men. Needless to say, no one was surprised to see these particular individuals in Hell, least of all in Greed.

One of the shades, a Turian dressed in the armor of a Blue Suns Commander, stepped forward and looked directly at Shepard. "He told us you would make it this far. I figured that three-headed monster would have killed you, but I guess I just underestimated you."

"What do you want?" Shepard demanded.

"Lucifer promised us all of the gold here if we could kill you and your friends, Commander Shepard" The head shade cocked his assault rifle before adding: "So if you excuse me, we're about to collect our biggest paycheck ever."

Miranda felt tempted to facepalm at this. "Don't be dense. What on Earth are you going to do with so much gold? Especially when there's absolutely nothing here you can spend it on."

"She is right." Thane Krios said. "You are all wasting your time. Let us pass."

"Fuck that. We've all been suffering here for ages now. This is our chance to finally start getting some back!"

And with this declaration, the army of shades opened fire with their arsenal, with Shepard and company weathering the assault just long enough to get behind cover as the bullets continued to fly, eating away at the mounds of gold, silver, and rock and sending chips of metal and rubble flying in all directions.

"There's too many!" Miranda said. "We'll never be able to fight them all off!"

"Me and just any two of you could always take out dozens of these idiots." Shepard pointed out. "Imagine what eleven of us could do."

"Do you really want to risk that?" Miranda asked, frowning at Shepard's lack of fear in the face of being completely outnumbered and shot at by dozens of people at once.

"I don't see how else we're getting out of here except through them." Shepard pointed out. "And this cover isn't going to hold for much longer, so we need to make a choice fast."

It was then that Mordin spoke up: "Think there might be better way." Mordin pointed to large metal containers filled to the brim with gold and jewels being lifted up and carried on a twisting rail that took them to the factory in the center of the circle.

"Might be able to acquire passage to factory by getting into those. Factory good defensive position. Odds of survival higher there."

"We'd need to run to them. It's a risk."

"Don't see any other way." Mordin confessed. "Have no choice. Necessary risk."

"Alright then. On three, I want Jack, Miranda, and Thane to unleash the biggest biotic wave they can at those shades. Then we bolt for the belt and hitch a ride on some of the empty containers. Three…"

As Shepard said this the hailstorm of bullets began to destroy the last of the squad's cover. Grunt became vulnerable first due to his bigger body and growled as bullets struck his energy shields and began to tear through them.

"Two...one...NOW!"

Leaping from behind cover, Miranda, Jack, and Thane conjoined their biotic power to unleash a massive wave of energy that knocked most of the attacking shades backwards and into others, allowing Shepard and his squad to make their way to the containers. What shades hadn't been knocked over by the attack opened fire, but Shepard and his allies returned fire, cutting down several of the shades as their recovering energy shields bore the brunt of the enemy attacks that managed to connect. Finally, they reached some of the containers. The biotics used their powers to help others into them before getting in themselves, with Shepard and Zaeed providing covering fire for everyone else and being the last to get in. As they were carried up into the air and off to the factory, the army of shades continued to shoot at them, but Shepard and his allies now had something of a height advantage, and were able to rain bullets down on the shades, cutting down several more.

Eventually, after several more moments of intense gunfire exchanged between the two groups, the containers at last came to the factory proper where Shepard and his crew leaped off the containers before their contents were dumped into a smelting pit that waited below. Most were able to land safely, with Thane, Jack, and Miranda using their biotics to ease the descent of the others as well as their own.

"I think you need to put off a few pounds, big guy." Jack grumbled as she stopped to catch her breath after expending so much biotic energy. Grunt chuckled in response to this. "It's all muscle."

"Well, I think we managed to get to a more defensible position at least." Shepard observed. "Even if those shades follow us here, we can better hold them off in this factory than out in the open."

"Yeah, especially with these."

Turning to the source of Garrus' voice, everyone could see him pointing to a weapons rack housing some exotic looking firearms.

"I think I just found us some new toys to play with. I call dibs on this one." Garrus grabbed a massive silver weapon that looked like the Cain mixed with an 18th century human cannon. Embers seemed to dance in the long barrel of the weapon, and it looked like it took a fair bit of effort on Garrus' part just to hold the thing at all.

"Heavier than she looks, but I've still got a good feeling about this one."

"Well I'm taking this one." Shepard said, grabbing a gun that resembled an Assault Rifle but with a bronze front styled to look like a dragon's head. Like the weapon Garrus had chosen, embers seemed to be ever-present in the gun's barrel, here the yawning, tooth-filled mouth of the dragon's head.

"I'm taking this one." Grunt said, greedily grabbing the weapon resembling a shotgun the same way a young child would try to snatch up a toy they coveted. Of course to Grunt there was no better "toy" than a powerful gun with which to blow his enemies away.

"This is an interesting looking weapon." Thane noted as he took a crossbow made of black wood and rusting metal, with cruel spikes jutting out of it's sides.

"It's a crossbow." Miranda said matter-of-factly. "More than a little antiquated at this point in time."

"I doubt it's an ordinary crossbow though." Shepard pointed out. "Might as well take it too."

"Then I suppose I shall bear it for now."

"So this factory's got an armory in it too, eh? Looks like we really did make a smart move coming here."

Snarling reverberated through the cavernous space of the factory mere moments after Shepard said this. Turning to the source they saw clambering up the rusting metal walls and black iron ladders several monstrous figures that were two gaunt torsos stuck to one skinny little pair of legs. For each and every one of them one of the two torsos clutched a pile of gold tightly to it's chest while the other's stomach looked to have been carved open, but with nothing inside save blackness.

When it became clear that these monstrous fusions of hoarder and waster were accosting Shepard and his allies they decided it was the perfect time to put their recently acquired armaments to use.

Shepard's new assault rifle unleashed a withering and merciless hail of fiery bullets that tore through any and all of the shades they struck. The others weapons were similarly devastating. Each blast of Grunt's new shotgun unleashed a fiery explosion more appropriate for a grenade than a shotgun blast and doing about as much damage too. There tended to be absolutely nothing left of any shades that were blasted by it.

Once Thane got the hang of the crossbow he was unleashing iron bolts from it as well as he had any bullet from a sniper rifle. And as he looked on each of the iron bolts was successful in putting down it's target, striking with just as much as force and ballistic power as any sniper rifle Thane had ever used. No, this was most definitely not an ordinary crossbow.

"Ha!" Grunt bellowed as he blew away another hoarder-waster. "I like these new weapons. They're laying waste to these fools!"

"Looks like there's something in this place that's good after all." Garrus quipped as he readied the heavy weapon he'd taken. As he did the inside of the barrel became white hot as the embers within rapidly grew into something much more.

"You all may want to stand back."

No sooner did everyone heed Garrus' warning and backpedal did the Turian unleash the full power of the weapon he had chosen. What followed was a brutal rapid-fire stream of exploding fireballs that sent up so much hellfire and smoke it was blinding to any who dared to look at it. The hoarder-wasters screamed in agony as they were all blown away or else incinerated by the merciless hellfire of the weapon. When the dust settled not even the gold coins the hoarder half had clutched so tightly were spared, having been reduced to black ash.

"...holy fucking shit." Jack breathed in as everyone stared in awe at the destructive power of the weapon. Garrus grinned in response. "I can't believe I'm saying this but I think I may have found a new favorite gun. You can keep the Cain, Shepard. This beauty's all I'll ever need."

"Let's hope these new weapons are enough for whatever comes next." Shepard said before adding: "Come on, there needs to be a way out of here."

"Fool. If there was a way out of Hell all would take it."

Turning around, Shepard and his crew saw a broad-shouldered man with chiseled features, close-cropped hair, a round nose, and a stern expression. He was dressed in clothing that Shepard and Miranda recognized as Ancient Roman, and clothes of status too. He even held in his hands a gladius. With him were more of the hoarder-wasters as well as shades from all times, places, and species.

"Kill them! Kill them so we may at last claim our prize!"

What followed was an intense and brutal shootout as another army of shades went at Shepard and his crew, who used the factory as cover while various shades shot at them with everything from bullets to arrows to things Shepard for one had never even seen before. Those with melee weapons rushed in and most were swiftly blown away for their troubles. A few got through though and tried to tackle some of them. Thane and Kasumi were able to defend themselves with martial arts skills, while over a dozen shades dog-piled Grunt to bring him down. Jack blasted some off of him, and Grunt forced the rest off, roaring as he did. The one man in the Roman clothing managed to get within striking range as well, going straight for Shepard.

"I shall be the one to slay you, Shepard!" The man roared. "I will be the one who has all the gold in Hell, and no one else! I am Gessius Florus, and I shall not be denied!" He struck with his Gladius, and Shepard blocked it with his new rifle.

"Is that right?" Shepard asked as the sound of gunfire filled his ears so much he could barely hear his own voice. "What about all of your partners here?"

"What of them?" Gessius demanded. "They mean nothing to me! They all know how this works! He who deals the death blow claims the prize! And I shall be the one to do it!"

A bullet zipped through the air at that moment and went through Gessius Florus' head and out the other end. He dropped his gladius and fell backwards, his body vanishing into gray-black smoke as it did.

"So much for that" Garrus quipped after seeing that his sniper shot was a kill. As more and more of the shades and hoarder-wasters closed in, the Turian also decided that now was a good time to unleash the heavy weapon again. He re-drew it, leaped out from behind cover and let fly. Between that and the combined firepower of Shepard and the rest of his squad, none of the shades survived.

"Looks like no one's getting that reward after all." Shepard observed darkly. "Come on. Let's get out of here."

Author's Note: I figured when doing this crossover that I could have some elements in it that would make it feel more like a piece of actual DLC. And what's a good ME DLC without some cool new weapons am I right? Not to mention that the unique setting of hell allowed me to experiment with some particularly exotic weapon designs.

That's everything for now. Hope you enjoyed the chapter!